Registering a birth in Brazil

01/25/23 my husband and I are both American citizens. We do have residency in Peru by having a child there. We had a baby in Belo Horizonte on December 18. In the past few weeks we have been trying to register our child and seek to go forward in seeking residency here. It's been quite confounding and no one has known what to do since we are Americans. We did manage to get our CPFs.

We have gone to the notary and policia and both turned us away saying they could do nothing to help us. Also the hospital only put my name down and not my husbands since our American marriage isn't recognized in Brazil.

can anyone help us? any information on getting all legal documents needed for the Brazilian and American citizenship of our son would be great! Also any info on seeking residency in Brazil.

thanks!

joy
-@joyringnald

Hi, Joy. Sorry that you're having trouble -- you should not be. Let me preface the following by saying that you should be in Brazil to register your child, and plan on being here until the registration is completed. Trying to do it at a distance will be very difficult, if not impossible.

Did the hospital tell you why they don't think that your US marriage is recognized in Brazil? Unless there's something about your marriage that obviously violates Brazilian law -- and I assume that there isn't -- that's incorrect information. Brazil generally recognizes foreign marriages, as foreign countries generally recognize Brazilian marriages. You and your husband should go back together -- you should always be together during this process -- to the hospital with your US marriage certificate, and ask the hospital to re-issue the Declaration of Live Birth with both your names on it. You should be pleasant, respectful, and courteous, but insistent. If the hospital re-issues the document with both of your names, you and your husband should take it to the cartório (which may be right there in the hospital) and register your child. You should be able to do that with no problem.

If either the hospital or the cartório refuses to cooperate, you're probably going to need a Brazilian lawyer. See the drop-down list under "Brasília Consular District" on this US Embassy page for the names and contact information of English-speaking attorneys in Belo Horizonte :

https://br.usembassy.gov/u-s-citizen-se … attorneys/

With respect to your son's US citizenship, you should register him at the nearest US Consulate.  Technically Minas Gerais is in the Brasília Consular District, but most people in Minas who need US consular services go to the US Consulate General in Rio de Janeiro, which is closer.  I suppose that you could also register him at a US Consulate in Peru if that's more convenient for you, but I don't know how things are done there.

Its been quite a while now. But as far as I remember, you need blue paper provided by the hospital right after birth.  Parents CPF, passport, proof of address.

with all this documents go to a notar. It will be done in 10 min.

father of the child has nothing to do with marriage certificate. Why they are asking, have no idea. They didn't in my case.

I wish you all the best.

@James Hi my name is John and I am a single parent for 13 years when my wife left me and  our special needs baby to return to Brazil. I believe my wife may have registered our daughters birth in Brazil and seek to obtain a copy of the birth certificate. I have no means of contacting her to ask her, She travelled all over Brazil so the registration may have taken place in Belo Horizonte, Rio de janeiro, Fortaleza, Manaus, Natal, Salvador de bahia, Sao Paulo or Minais Gerais are my best guesses. Possibly around March 2008. DOB was 24/10/2007.

I would guess there is not one database I could search so could you suggest best way forward for me to begin my detective work?

regards

John

10/09/23 @jsr3012.  Good morning, John.  From your description of your situation - that your wife left you and your daughter in your country of residence shortly after your daughter's birth to return to Brazil  - it's highly doubtful that your daughter's birth was ever registered here.  There's no process in a Brazilian notary office to register the birth of a child born outside Brazil and living outside Brazil, and no benefit to a Brazilian to try to register such a birth.

To register your daughter, the notary would have required the physical presence of your daughter, her birth certificate from her country of birth, the registration of her birth from the Brazilian Consulate in that country, and the identity documents of both parents.  Your wife would not have been able to walk into a notary office and register the birth of an absent child on her word alone.

My ex had one trip back to Brazil in 2008 with our daughter so the grandmother could meet her grandchild. She may have registered it then. She would have had our daughter's passport and possibly birth certificate from UK.

Marriage certificate was registered in Toronto, Canada at Brazilian embassy/consulate. It was 2010 she left us and returned to Brazil.

In Brazil I believe it is illegal to register the birth again if it has already previously been done.

10/10/23 @jsr3012.  Thanks, John.  That's important information, and makes a difference.

If your daughter had a Brazilian passport in 2008, then the Consulate that issued her passport probably registered her birth at the same time, and gave your wife a Certidão Consular for registering the birth in Brazil.  The logical place to do that -- and the place most likely to accept the registration -- would be the Cartório de Registro Civil, the Notary Office of the Civil Registry, in the city where her mother was living at the time of the visit.

The oldest and largest Cartório of that type in any city is often called the "Cartório do 1º Ofício", so that would be the logical place to start your search.  Most cities of any size have more than one "Registro Civil" office, however, with different numbers, so if there's no record in the Cartório do 1º Ofício, there still may be one in another Registro Civil office in the same city.

@abthree She travelled on a British passport not a Brazilian one. But thanks for background info on the registration process.

  10/12/23  @abthree She travelled on a British passport not a Brazilian one. But thanks for background info on the registration process.       -@jsr3012

Even traveling on a British passport, if your wife tried to record your daughter's birth certificate, it probably would have been in the city where her mother was living. 

If you are trying to establish your daughter's right to Brazilian citizenship, you may be able to do that by contacting the Brazilian Consulate responsible for the place where she was born.  There is no time limit on registering the birth of a Brazilian abroad.